Since the year 2000, there has been a long standing ban on tracking how people use government internet sites using cookies and similar technologies. In 2009, the Obama administration proposed to scale back this ban, allowing visitors to government websites to be profiled and have their information taken from them. Supporters of this change, giving government websites the right to track users, say that social networking sites often take advantage of the tracking technologies and they have revolutionized the way people and communicate and keep up with one another. One of Obama's aides said that allowing these government websites to use the technologies would greatly increase public involvement and make government more transparent. However, some privacy groups argue that the proposal brings about an unexplained shift in government policy, allowing these government agencies to gather all the personal information on the users of their websites. Vivek Kundra, the government's chief information officer, wrote that the new policy is intended to improve customer service on government agency websites by analyzing how visitors use the site and remembering users individual data and preferences to make the site more compatible to them.
There has always been use of cookies and other technologies to track individuals on the internet but until now, government websites have been exempt from these technologies. So do we want government websites to enable the use of tracking technologies? Could they be just wanting to gather information on us for some bigger reason that we do not know about? Or could they only want to know our information so that everytime we visit their website they can taylor the content to our liking just to get a vote?
Hsu, Spencer, and Cecilia Kang. "Obama Web-Tracking Proposal Raises Privacy Concerns." Washington Post [Washington D.C.] 11 08 2009, n. pag. Web. 8 Apr. 2012. <http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/08/10/AR2009081002743.html>.
I think that the government is never as simple as it seems. I do believe that they want to use such tracking technologies to increase customer satisfaction on their websites, but I also believe that if there is not currently an underlying motive then there will be. They are not just going to let valuable information just sit around when they could be turning it over to departments. This has fishy written all over it.
ReplyDeleteI think I will not have a problem if i knew if the information was going to be used to more productive. I think companies and the government needs to show how they will protect this sensitive infomration and instead of worrying how to govern the web.
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